La Liga: Why new signing Mario Mandzukic is proving the perfect fit for Diego Simeone's Atletico Madrid team

It’s been an impressive beginning to Mario Mandzukic’s career at Atletico Madrid with the powerful forward scoring in each of his first two games at the Vicente Calderon stadium. His first secured the Super Cup against Real Madrid and the second turned out to be the winner against Eibar.

But it’s not just that Mandzukic has got off to such a fine start in an Atletico shirt, it’s the manner of the goals. The strike that did for Real came from a long ball by Miguel Moya before being flicked on with the head of Antoine Griezmann and tucked away past Iker Casillas. That first Primera Liga goal was a routine header dispatched into the net from a Gabi free-kick. It’s typical Mandzukic.

Live La Liga Football

After life under Pep Guardiola at Bayern Munich, it’s not difficult to see why he might be feeling at home. Working with Diego Simeone, Mandzukic is appreciated once more. “I’m very happy, especially with the coach,” he told reporters at his initial press conference as an Atleti player. “I think we see football the same way. Regarding Pep Guardiola, I prefer not to talk about it.”

On the face of it, there seemed little reason for the tensions that emerged with his former boss. Upon Guardiola’s arrival, Mandzukic had just played a pivotal role in Bayern’s glorious 2012/13 season - a year in which the team won the Champions League for only the second time in 38 years.

Then coach Jupp Heynckes was a confirmed admirer. But plans were already afoot to bring in Robert Lewandowski from Borussia Dortmund and with Guardiola taking over, Mandzukic rarely found himself on the same wavelength as the Spaniard. In January, the striker appeared to refuse the coach’s handshake after being substituted in a Bundesliga game against Stuttgart.

In truth, this antipathy was professional not personal. Bayern’s explosive football that so did for Barcelona in that 7-0 two-legged battering in 2013 has given way to the tiki-taka style synonymous with Guardiola and Spain’s national team. For Mandzukic, it’s not an obvious fit and as Diego Costa found out this summer to his cost, that approach is a world away from Simeone’s Atletico.

“If you don’t take advantage of Costa’s runs, you isolate him,” said the Atleti boss in discussing Costa’s World Cup woe that amounted to two appearances, two defeats and no goals in Brazil. “He likes to exploit the spaces, to attack from deep positions and to get on the end of final passes, but Spain’s football focuses more on the collective.”

Not suited

Mandzukic fared rather better than that at Bayern last season, still managing to net 26 goals in all competitions – the best goalscoring season of his career. But it was evident to the player himself that he was not being utilised in the way that best suited his attributes.

“It's a great club and I never thought I'd want to leave,” he reportedly told Croatian newspaper Sportske Novosti in the summer, before adding with disarming frankness, “but, let's be honest, I cannot play to my strengths under Guardiola's style no matter how hard I try.”

Saturday’s Madrid derby at the Bernabeu is likely to illustrate the point well. Mandzukic’s last trip to the Bernabeu as a Bayern player saw the visitors lose the first leg of their Champions League semi-final in April. Bayern had 72 per cent possession that night, but Mandzukic had only 32 touches and mustered just one off-target effort on goal. Time and again, he was bypassed.

In that Super Cup game at the Calderon w